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The Early Ones: Predecessors and Forerunners
The year is 1975. Jaws is playing at the movie theatre, about to become an overnight blockbuster. Unlike today, in an era of rampant bootlegging and peer-to-peer distribution, in this year there is no concern about unscrupulous visitors taping the movie on their portable video recorders, in part, because there is no such thing as a video cassette, nor a camcorder, let alone a memory card in a cameraphone. That will soon change though, as the same year Sony Corp. introduces the Betamax, and JVC counters with the VHS tape. Perhaps a good thing to record on your Video Home System might be that new comedy program, Saturday Night Live, which has only just debuted. On the radio, Elton John is singing about a certain Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, but really, the only thing noteworthy in the sky right now are a pair of American and Russian space capsules, part of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, which are docking in orbit as part of a peaceful scientific experiment.What Happened in 1975, including Pop Culture, Prices, Events, and Technology. (n.d.). Retrieved June 26, 2012, from http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/1975.html. Meanwhile, somewhere in Reno, Nevada, Purington, J. (n.d.). Astraltune Stereopack Information Page. Retrieved June 26, 2012, from http://www.justabuzz.com/astraltune.shtml. something else is quietly being revealed to the public, a device which could be responsible for social impacts happening today, some thirty-six years later. It is a portable device that ... wait for it ... plays music. The Astraltune Stereo Pack (1975) Well, perhaps that sounded a bit overblown. A portable music player, by today's standards, is nothing revolutionary, more or less a thing of convenience that has been largely taken for granted for the ten years we've jammed to our iPods, perhaps even longer if you count the universal acceptance of that famous Japanese product called the Walkman. Well, be that as it may, the point to consider here is that the Astraltune is none of the above, not an iPod, nor the Walkman. It predates both products by twenty-six years, and three years, respectively, effectively bestowing it with the honor of being the first production portable audio player in the world. Purportedly, even the Astraltune Stereopack is predated by Andrea Pavel's Stereobelt portable audio player, but this device was not sold to the public.Rohter, L. (2005, December 17). An Unlikely Trendsetter Made Earphones a Way Of Life. The New York Times. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/17/international/americas/17pavel.html?pagewanted=all. The Astraltune, however, was far from perfect. It was heavy, powered by a lead-acid battery, large, requiring a chest harness to carry it, and somewhat clumsy to operate, all controls hidden under a zippered fabric flap. As if to compensate for these shortcomings though, elements of what would soon become a rampant marketing combination were employed. Bright colours (the body of the unit was neon blue), operational simplicity (only five controls), reusability (rechargeable batteries), and high acoustic quality (via a pair of German Sennheiser headphones), were all part of the Astraltune package. Pity these things weren't enough to propel the device to fame, for nearly the same formula worked for the later Walkman (over 200 million sold) Fenech, S. (2010, October 26). Walkman into History. The Daily Telegraph. p. 08., and became the magic recipe for Apple's iPod (over 100 million sold and counting). Reuters. (2007, April 09). Apple Sells 100M iPods. eWeek. Interestingly, the Astraltune was marketed only to a specific audience: downhill skiers. In a move that may have been the demise of the device and the company (which is believed to have ceased operations prior to 1980) Purington, J. (n.d.). Astraltune Stereopack Information Page. Retrieved June 26, 2012, from http://www.justabuzz.com/astraltune.shtml. the portable music player is only advertised in skiing magazines, neglecting the rest of the potential market that would have eagerly lapped up the Astraltune, perhaps if some miniaturization had been done and a few improvements had been performed to what was arguably an immature, early-generation product. '- SOUND BITE -' "Imagine standing at the top of an untracked slope, accompanied by ASTRALTUNE, your personal, portable, stereo sound system. You push off to the flowing rhythm of your favorite tune." Promotional brochure for the original Astraltune. Whether or not the Astraltune inspired the Walkman can never be certainly proven, but what is known, is that just three years later, half a world away, a certain man was playing tennis in Japan, and wished for a minute that instead of hearing grunts and the squeak of sneakers during the game, he could listen to something else: music. Barry, Dan. (2009, July 05). Stereo for One, a Brief Unaccompanied History. The New York Times. p. 03. The man's name was Akio Morita. and Morita-sama was the chairman of Sony Corporation. An idea had just been born, but unlike the Astraltune, this one really would change the world. The Sony Walkman (1979) By 1978, Sony already had a long history of producing high-quality, trendsetting electronic products. It had, for example, already introduced the world's smallest transistor radio (1955), the high-quality Trinitron television (1968), Sony Corp. (n.d.). History. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/CorporateInfo/History. and the compact portable cassette dictaphone known as the Pressman (1977), Bellis, M. (n.d.). Who Invented the Sony Walkman? About.com. Paragraph 4. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://inventors.about.com/od/wstartinventions/a/Walkman.htm. to name just a few. As the seventies began to close, company founder Masaru Ibuka and chairman Akio Morita had a discussion with the head of the Tape Recorder Business Division, Kozo Ohsone, about how the monoaural (monophonic) Pressman should be upgraded to include stereo record-and-playback capabilities. After this exchange of ideas, Morita had an inspiration for a new use of the Pressman ... music and entertainment. '- SOUND BITE -' "This is the product that will satisfy those young people who want to listen to music all day. They'll take it everywhere with them, and they won't care about record functions. If we put a playback only headphone stereo like this on the market, it'll be a hit." Akio Morita, February 1979, Sony Headquarters. Bellis, M. (n.d.). Who Invented the Sony Walkman? About.com. Paragraph 4. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://inventors.about.com/od/wstartinventions/a/Walkman.htm. The Sony Pressman Portable cassette recorders had been around for a few years now, and although they were heavy and unwieldy, nothing technically prevented a user from plugging in a set of headphones and taking their tunes with them -- except the notoriety of being the only person doing so, and the inconvenient weight and size of the unit. As the previous quote goes to prove, Morita had come to understand that recording, the key feature that often tipped the scales in all prior portable cassette units, including Sony's own Pressman, could be done away with if the user only cared about playback purposes. The audio quality would also have to be significantly increased on a device being marketed solely for music reproduction, but this alone would not negatively affect the cassette player's dimensions or weight. Making Headphones Fashionable Something else that would have to be dealt with, was the headphones that accompanied Morita's proposed cassette music player. Ever since headphones had been invented, in 1870s Utah by a Mormon named Nathaniel Baldwin, their sole purpose, not unlike that of the contemporary Pressman, was for dialogue reproduction, with music reproduction quality often disappointing. Secondly, they were often large and weighty due to the amount of metal they contained; Baldwin's earliest versions, for example, bought in bulk by the US Navy, were reported to contain up to a mile of coiled copper wire. Anonymous. (2011, January 09). Against Headphones. New York Times Magazine. A lightweight Japanese music player, paired with cast-iron headgear, would be doomed to fail. Also, unlike the intentionally conspicuous white earbuds of Apple's iPod, introduced to a public used to wearing them for over twenty years, Sony's Walkman was essentially treading in uncharted territory. Up until now, headphones were essentially restricted to military organizations, recording companies, and perhaps the odd audiophile's sound den. Morita's task, as it were, would be to make headphones fashionable and desirable, and to do this they must be light enough for the consumer to mount upon their head, sound good enough to prompt them to keep wearing them, and look good enough to persuade others to do the same. The resulting product was the S-Air headset. It was immediately paired with the new audio player, which had by now been titled the Walkman, inferring that the new music player could work nicely on someone's morning jog or walk. Just like the Astraltune before it, and the iPod that was yet to come, athletics and fitness were found to be an attractive marketing aid. Marketing A Strange New Product Morita's Walkman could potentially be a mass-market hit, or it could be a flop akin to the Astraltune, which by now had already faded deep into obscurity. The key to success would be in the effective marketing of the new product, using untested formulas that would not take aim at midlife male head of the family, responsible for buying the household's radios and televisions, nor the executive, salaryman, or press-man attending keynotes with his dictaphone. The new marketing strategy would instead appeal to the youth sector of Japan, the "young people who want to listen to music all day," as Morita had so aptly put it slightly over a year earlier. Marketing the Walkman would be done in a two-pronged approach. The technical aspects of the unit perfected, lightness and sound quality achieved, it would now have to look good, and look like nothing that Sony had ever before produced. Monochrome blacks and woodgrains, as were popular for the last two decades in the electronics industry, were to be partially abandoned in favor of a shade of blue for the player body (remember the Astraltune?) while the headphones used a measure of brushed steel. The second element of the marketing strategy adopted for the Walkman, was how it was going to be introduced to the public. Instead of a staid press-conference or keynote address, Sony executives cryptically invited journalists to meet with company reps in a major park in Tokyo. Those who arrived were given early production Walkmans, each playing the same cassette with synchronized timing, and told to listen. Over their headphones, in high-quality stereo, various aspects of the new device were explained, audio samples were played, and when the narrator came to extol the virtues of portable music and how it could be applied to a variety of daily scenarios, on cue, vibrant young people, all using Walkmans, would appear in the park before them, such as a couple on a tandem bicycle riding to the beat of their own tunes. Initial reviews were cool yet positive, but the pubic was not immediately won over. Jenish, D., Davies, T. (1999, August 30). The Walkman at 20. Maclean's Magazine. p. 10. '- DID YOU KNOW? -' The price for the original first generation Sony Walkman was $450 in 1979. Fenech, S. (2010, October 26). Walkman into History. The Daily Telegraph. p. 08. Adjusted for inflation, that is approximately $1,326 in 2011 dollars. As per a calculation by the Bank of Canada. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/related/inflation-calculator. The calculation assumes that the previously quoted value of $450 is in CDN funds. As the first Walkmans rolled off the assembly line in July of 1979, production volumes were estimated at 50,000 units for the first batch, but a cautious Akio Morita, believing initial demand, at 3,000 units sold in the first month, to be disappointing, ordered this number cut to 30,000. Caution and optimism are two different things however, and so a new marketing approach was commissioned, something almost akin to the viral marketing we see today. So far, Sony had gotten the device into the hands (and the ears) of the press, but it had failed to actually let the fabled "young-people" play with the new toy; Walkman-wearing company reps were dispatched to preach the gospel of portable hi-fi, and preach it they did, on Japanese college campuses, buses, subways, Jenish, D., Davies, T. (1999, August 30). The Walkman at 20. Maclean's Magazine. p. 10. and in youth hotspot neighbourhoods like Shinjuku and Ginza. Sony Corp. (n.d.). History. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/CorporateInfo/History/SonyHistory/2-06.html. Wherever they went, and whoever they spoke to, the reps would doff their headphones and politely offer their subject a brief demonstration of what the Walkman was capable of. Once the buying public had their first taste of audio liberation, a momentum began to develop ... and the Walkman revolution was born. Massmarket Adoption From the start, Sony had plans to sell their new audio player in the West three months following the Tokyo debut, though it was believed that the name "Walkman" might do Sony a disservice, and so market-specific titles like the "Stowaway" or "Soundabout" were readied for British and American audiences, respectively. These plans were quickly dropped after Akio Morita, then traveling in France, was greeted by friends whose children had already heard of the brand new device and had petitioned their parents to ask "Mr. Morita for a Walkman." Sony Corp. (n.d.). History. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/CorporateInfo/History/SonyHistory/2-06.html. Following worldwide release, the early Walkman quickly found prominent followers in the arts and entertainment communities. Early adopters included celebrities like Andy Warhol, who was known to frequently comment on how he loved replacing the sound of New York City car horns with arias by Luciano Pavarotti, as well as casting other quirky praise on his Walkman, such as how the S-Air headphones kept his hair in place during windy weather. Barry, D. (2009, July 05). Stereo for One, a Brief Unaccompanied History. The New York Times. p. 03. However, society was only just beginning to understand the negative impacts personal audio could bring. Overuse and excessive listening volumes could damage hearing (see part four), and then there was that other problem ... being tuned out altogether by a engrossed music listener. This new problem may have reached its zenith in the early eighties when one woman, ignored by her husband one too many times in favour of his Walkman and reggae cassettes, threatened divorce. Barry, D. (2009, July 05). Stereo for One, a Brief Unaccompanied History. The New York Times. p. 03. Ah, how times haven't changed. Planning For the Future And the Sony Discman (1984) As popular as the Walkman was proving to be by the early eighties, it may surprise the reader that in a way, Sony was already preparing to render the device obsolete just a few years later, by marketing a much higher-tech equivalent portable music player to a different, early-adopter demographic. Having already been a market leader in the development and popularization of the home "laser turntable," Fantel, H. (1984, June 03). Sound; Here Comes the New Equipment. New York Times. p. A23. which quickly became known as the compact disc or CD player, the Japanese electronics giant turned their attention towards creating a portable unit by 1984. This "CD Walkman" (which was branded the Discman outside of Japan), retailed for a similar "low price" Editorial. (1984, November 26). Audio Disc Players Coming of Age. New York Times. p. D1. as the analogue cassette based Walkman, but relied on the revolutionary new digital medium Here, "medium" refers to a device or object capable of storing data. It is not to be confused with a clairvoyant "medium." known as the CD. These stored noticeably higher-quality sound on a solid state disc, which was capable of being randomly programmed (playlisted) and yet never requiring tedious and time-consuming re-winding or fast-forwarding. Although there were initially limitations as to what music was purchasable in the CD format, this trend quickly reversed as US CD sales roughly doubled over a one year period between 1983 and 1984. Editorial. (1984, November 26). Audio Disc Players Coming of Age. New York Times. p. D1. Sony's foray into the digital audio world, however, may have ultimately been a misstep leading to their downfall in the portable audio sector. For by helping to create the digital compact disc, they laid the groundwork for disc based video storage, first through VCDs, then DVDs. How do these seemingly unrelated developments tie into the bigger picture you ask? Both required the introduction of video codecs A "codec" is the term used to refer to the "encoding" of raw data, sometimes analogue, into orderly digital formats for computers to use. See also: Codec. like the mp2 file format, in order to operate on computers. Sound familiar? It was from these nascent technologies that the mp3 file was born, and from there on, the game would change beyond recognition. - SOUND BITE - "are just flying out the door. The outlook is goodbye vinyl." Stan Goodman, VP for Tower Records, 1984. Editorial. (1984, November 26). Audio Disc Players Coming of Age. New York Times. p. D1. PLAYBACK CONTROL << RW | FFWD >> What was your first portable audio player? The Sony Walkman A cassette based derivative An iPod Citations Category:Articles Category:The Rise of the iPod